FGD 59: The Fancy Cats visit (8pm MT, SN West)

After nearly two weeks on the road, the Calgary Flames (30-20-8) are back on home ice! The Flames captured eight of a possible 12 points on the road, playing some pretty good hockey for the most part. They kick off a truncated home-stand tonight when they welcome the Florida Panthers (25-23-6) to town. The Fancy Cats aren’t quite as fancy as they used to be, as they’re eight games out of a playoff spot, but they’re still a fast young team.

The game starts just after 8 p.m. MT on Sportsnet West and Sportsnet 960 The Fan.

David Rittich starts for the Flames. He’s 6-2-2 with a 2.47 goals against average and .921 save percentage. He’s backed up by Jon Gillies. The expected healthy scratches are Matt Bartkowski and Morgan Klimchuk.

The Flames’ special teams have caused a great deal of hand-wringing of late, but they were one of the reasons they won against Nashville on Thursday night. For only the third time in the last 10 games, the Flames didn’t allow a power play goal. And for the first time since Dec. 31, they scored multiple power play goals. The Flames are a good even strength team, but good special teams will give them some breathing room in their games.

Johnny Gaudreau leads the Flames in scoring and is second in the NHL, eight points behind fellow 2011 draft pick Nikita Kucherov. Gaudreau’s next goal will be his 20th, joining teammates Sean Monahan, Matthew Tkachuk and Micheal Ferland in that club. Only two Flames score 20+ goals last season.

The Panthers

Roberto Luongo makes his long-awaited return to the Panthers crease for his first game since Dec. 4. He’s 6-6-1 with a 2.61 goals against average and .928 save percentage. Tonight will be Luongo’s 982nd career NHL appearance, third all-time behind only Martin Brodeur and Patrick Roy. He’s backed up by James Reimer. The expected scratches are Ian McCoshen, Connor Brickley and Radim Vrbata.

The Panthers are eight points out of the last wild-card spot, but they’ve won five of their last six games. Their one loss was to the Los Angeles Kings. Sure, their wins have been against some of the league’s odds and sods, but they’re still beating them. Florida’s no great shakes this year, but they’re still a young, proud bunch and could be a tough out for anybody who takes them lightly.

I agree that the Flames all around lack the gumption to get it down when it matters the most. Both the coaches and the players are to blame for this current loss at home. The next two games do not look very favorable when it comes to the win column just due to the fact both the coaches and the players will be over matched once again.

Without Smith in net to bail out this awful defense and defensive zone play might as well kiss this season goodbye if he doesn’t return soon. For a team that is in the middle of a playoff race they sure do look disengaged and disinterested at times and don’t play near enough desperation hockey.

This team just came off a 6 game road trip and played two of the toughest teams in the league. Gotta cut them a little slack. They’re not playing a terrible game (keep in mind I turned it off so I haven’t seen anything past the 3 minute mark of the 2nd) but when every mistake you make ends up in the back of the net, it’s going to seem like they’re playing like garbage.

Games like this will happen, gotta take them with the games they look like world-beaters.

I remember when Jim Playfair coached this team to 30 wins at home but a terrible road record. Now with Gully we are strong on the road but brutal at home, can’t these guys balance it out? The pp finally gets going then 1st game back after a road trip we get smacked by the cats.

I think I’m Actually Done with Brodie now… he’s starting to look like Bartowski out there! we really need some crunch on D… Some smash the other guys into the boards type of D-man(preferably someone who can drop the gloves and win a fight or two!